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Creationism piece no way to honor Darwin's birthday (Letter to the editor of the Boston Globe)
Boston Globe ^
| 7/20/2009
| Steven Pinker
Posted on 07/20/2009 8:07:23 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
SHAME ON you for publishing two creationist op-eds in two years from the Discovery Institute, a well-funded propaganda factory that aims to sow confusion about evolution. Virtually no scientist takes intelligent design seriously, and in the famous Dover, Pa., trial in 2005, a federal court ruled that it is religion in disguise.
The judge referred to the theorys breathtaking inanity, which is a fine description of Stephen Meyers July 15 op-ed Jeffersons support for intelligent design. Well, yes, Thomas Jefferson died 33 years before Darwin published The Origin of Species. And Meyers idea that the DNA code implies a code maker is just a rehash of the ancient argument from design - that an eye implies an eye maker, a heart implies a heart maker, and so on. Darwin demolished this argument 150 years ago.
In a year in which other serious publications are celebrating the bicentennial of Darwins birth and the sesquicentennial of Origin, the Globe sees fit to resurrect his long-buried opposition.
The advantage that traditional newspapers have over the Internet competition is quality control. If the Globe repeatedly gives its imprimatur to the latest nonsense from an anti-science lobbying organization, whats the point of going to it for reliable, intelligent commentary?
Steven Pinker
Cambridge
The writer is a professor of psychology at Harvard.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
TOPICS: Culture/Society; Philosophy
KEYWORDS: creationism; darwin; evolution; evospeculation; intelligentdesign; junkscience; sciencefiction; spontaneouslifers
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To: bezelbub
can nothing plus time equal something???
21
posted on
07/20/2009 11:42:08 PM PDT
by
Beamreach
(what is truth, Jesus Christ is truth, and truth shall set you free!!)
To: bezelbub
Can clay be turned into people, or not? Yes, because subtly and metaphorically, you've adduced the hand of God.
22
posted on
07/21/2009 7:16:32 AM PDT
by
Migraine
(Diversity is great... ...until it happens to YOU.)
To: DrewsDad
Isnt Pinker the one who advocated post-birth abortions?
Apparently so.
Read
this page
It says :
"According to Steven Pinker's articles in today's New York Times Magazine, the tendency for some young women to kill one-day-old infants (neonaticide) may be built into "the biological design of our parental emotions."
Neolithic women might have decided to cut their losses early on and let sickly infants, or those not promising to make it to adulthood, die rather than waste their time raising it. Such women mentally dealt with the decision as an unavoidable tragedy, but one necessary at the time.
After a lengthy discussion of the topic the author concludes with the inference that society will become more merciful to those teenagers who dump their kids in garbage cans once society understands why "the anguished girls" felt they had no choice but to do what they did.
To: Migraine
So... can rocks turn into people, or not? I think it has to be dust.
24
posted on
07/21/2009 7:20:59 PM PDT
by
Oztrich Boy
(In Soviet Russia, Sarah Palin's house can see YOU)
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